Saturday, December 08, 2007

Partisan Jabs

I'm going to be a good little Liberal blogger today and take a few jabs at the NDP and CPC. If Gilles Duceppe does something stupid by the end of the day (a 50/50 proposition at worst), I'll update the post to include a shot or two at him.

First up, remember that investigation into Liberal Party polling practices headed up by former PQ Cabinet Minister Danielle Paille? Well, you probably don't because his conclusions have been sitting in report purgatory for a month, no doubt waiting for a quiet December 24th publication. Well, it seems the CPC have broken Paul Martin's spending record, with the PMO quadrupling its polling budget since '05-06. When asked about it in the house, James Moore said he was "surprised" to learn this.

Speaking of James Moore surprises, hot on the heels of scantilycladwomangate, the NDP have been forced into yet another apology, this time over accusations levelled during the last election:

NDP House leader Libby Davies formally apologized Thursday on behalf of her party for spreading allegations that a Liberal candidate in the last federal election tried to bribe his NDP rival to drop out of the race.

“The New Democratic Party admits we seriously erred in making the allegations public and in putting a young and inexperienced candidate in a position where he felt justified in making those allegations and to repeat them on some 40 occasions to media across Canada,” Ms. Davies told the Commons.

[...]

Ms. Davies admitted that the NDP erred in arranging for Hansen-Carlson to repeat his accusations widely in the media 10 days before the Jan. 26, 2006 election. And she said it made “another serious error in judgment” in failing to make public a letter from Canada's elections commissioner, three days before the election, which cleared the two Liberals.

You think? But, really, NDP errors in judgement aren't that surprising; they're as much a way of life as Liberal patronage or Conservatives complaining about Liberal patronage...

OTTAWA — The Conservative government appointed a raft of Tories to federal boards, agencies and as citizenship judges yesterday.

At least seven of the 11 appointments yesterday to the National Film Board, Via Rail, the CDIC, two shipping agencies, and citizenship judgeships, went to people with Tory links. They include a former MP, a former Manitoba MLA who now works for a Conservative MP, a former Canadian Alliance candidate, and advisers to federal and provincial Tory ministers.

Stephen Harper practicing blatant patronage after railling against it for all those years? Man, he really must be using Mulroney as a mentor...

27 Comments:

It's hard to muster up any enthusiasm for talking about politics lately. Although I'm definitely still firmly behind the NDP on policy matters.

I can certainly see why the latest SES poll sees more and more Canadians (spontaneously!) choosing **none of the above.** **Unprecedented,** Nik Nanos calls it. I'll see him that and raise him a **depressing.**

Canajun said... **It's about rhetoric. It's about being sick of the pounding negativity that pervades our entire political process these days, in ALL parties. **

A member of the Green Party's council is now over 60 days into her "hunger strike" against uranium mining in Eastern Canada.

Actually, once you look into it, it's no hunger strike but actually a high calorie liquid diet (supplemented with maple syrup, fruit juices etc) and fully endorsed by Elizabeth May and the GP- in effect supporting EM's long running anti-nuke activism from her Sierra Club days.

tonyguitar said"I can certainly see why the latest SES poll sees more and more Canadians (spontaneously!) choosing **none of the above.** **Unprecedented,** Nik Nanos calls it. I'll see him that and raise him a **depressing.**"

I think we need some changes to our current parliamentary model.MPs should represent the will of the majority of their constituents not the position of their party.I would like the opportunity to review my representative's voting history and other accomplishments every year with the right to recall available should the majority so desire.Something like this perhaps is a start.http://www.wegovern.ca/

I would have it such that candidates seeking to represent a riding can run under a party banner or not as they see fit, but those that have a party affiliation are beholden to their constituents not their party or its leader.

I'm not sure attacking Harper and the Conservatives on the patronage issue will provide your party any political mileage. Especially when you consider that the Liberals essentially opposed Harper's plan to create create a Public Appointments Commission which would have removed all patronage powers from the PMO.

Remember when the Libs teamed up with the Peggy Nash and the NDP to smear Gwyn Morgan: Canada's #1 CEO who accepted the job to create the commission for $1 per year? That partisan play by the Libs/NDP derailed the entire process.

There are still over 60 vacancies and 11 Senate appointments that Harper refuses to make.

Harper is by no means a wealthy man and to this day he refuses to take part in the MP's pension plan. By all means Dan, I hope you guys use this as a wedge issue in the next election.

Brian, you taking the koolaide intraveniously now?Yep, they should have thrown rose pedals at Morgan's feet, he of such high calibre and high esteem.Yep. Despite having obvious CON blue blood credentials as a fund raiser (tho most of his magic on that account no doubt is hidden in the 'Stephen Harper for President' leadership race in 2001, all hush-hush on any and all donors) and maybe a tad red in the collar, Morgan would have been a fine choice to be vetting these appointments. I'm certain that he could have gotten those 'at least 7 with CON credentials' up to 9 or 10, leaving room for some token Bloc head...I think your original instinctive response -- The Liberals did it too! -- will continue to charm the electorate until they're so stunned by Harper's sheer blunt hypocrisy that they will hand him both the keys to Sussex and Stoneaway. No sense looking in the mirror, that idiot approaching is you yourself.

I have always said that harper and his crew are hypocrites. Their veneer of propriety is only paper-thin.

I’m not saying that the old Liberals are any better. Just that the CPC is the same.

Anyway, harper has no control over and can’t even account for $1.5b in this fund. From Kevin Grandia at desmogblog:

“5 Dec 07 Yesterday at a meeting of the Standing Committee on Environment and Sustainable Development, Canada's Minister of the Environment waffled about heavily and refused to provide a full accounting of the government's $1.519 billion Canada Eco Trust Fund for Clean Air and Climate Change.This follows on criticism two weeks ago of the Eco Trust by the government's Auditor General, Sheila Fraser, who stated: We are deeply concerned about very large transfers being made purportedly for certain purposes. But when you look at the actual agreements there are absolutely no conditions requiring the recipient to use the moneys for the purposes being announced."

This comes after a billion was spend on arming the border guards. Turns out that a good number refuse to be armed and it will cost the government $$ to replace/re-deploy the guards.

I'm the kool-aid drinker? I think you should unscrew the propeller from your tin-foil hat and get your facts straight.

Gwyn Morgan wasn't being appointed to make or vet appointments. He had assembled a small group of distinguished Canadians (including Liberal Cabinet Minister Roy Maclaren and non-partisans Jacqueline Boulet and Hassan Khosrowshahi) to establish:

1. legislation for making appointments that would ensure that only the most qualified people would get the jobs and,

2. Annually report to Parliament with the results of all appointments measured against the qualifications.

Let me know when you've successfully managed to remove the foot from your fat mouth. In the meantime, I will be letting the air out of the tires on your "house".

To intelligent and reasonable liberals: I wasn't suggesting that the Cons shouldn't be called out when they deserve it (i.e. polling) but simply that the patronage one probably isn't the best fight to pick.

Regardless of Morgan's credentials, the fact that Harper childishly said that he would consider no other person for the position shows he has no commitment to it. There is no position that can only be done by one person, and, having had his choice democratically rejected, he should have nominated someone else.

How witty, how about when is Harper going to apologize for being a fat piece of shit?

And could the Cons apologize for blowing a chance to end one party rule in Canada by deciding to hand out mandatory mins to people who grow one pot plant, to make Canada the most ass backwards country in the Commonwealth on dealing with climate change, and to take bribes from international arms dealers. Way to go losers!

I happen to think Jack's moustachio is the likely source of the NDP's policy ideas.

Only a moustache could still support policies that frankly went out of style when the Berlin wall fell. Ideas conceived in idiocy that deny fundamental characteristics of human nature.

A shitty moustache is the only thing that could seriously deny that a market economy cannot be created by simultaneous equations or by bureaucrats playing at markets. Those prices would be empty, in contrast to market prices, which are rich in content. Markets—that is, actual choices by sellers and buyers—reveal and stimulate the discovery of knowledge that is otherwise left undiscovered. Market prices, free to fluctuate spontaneously, deliver that ever-changing knowledge sufficiently to permit effective economic calculation. To do their informative work, prices have to arise from real transactions. Without market prices (a redundancy, really) there would be no way to economize resources in behalf of consumer well-being. As Mises said, socialism, as an economic system, is impossible. As impossible and unforgivable as a weird moustache.

Oh a weird mustache, you mean he doesn't look like a baby faced mormon, how odd!

Why am I not surprised to see neo-liberals trying to understand facial hair by relating it back to their religion. Its kind of cute actually, like a Jehova Witness using her 'Awake' magazine to decipher the meaning of hackey sack...

Right, taking government seriously is accepting bribes from international arms dealers, handing out patronage appointments to your buddies, and playing slide show presentations of your ex-girlfriend in her underwear on your laptop in the HOC. Yeah, tut tut, NDP, when oh when will the working class in Canada grow up and behave with the proper dignity and class of our Old Boys Club ruling elite.

Yeh, amen to that, Canada's comfortable class have long wished that the ridings in Canada which voted for the NDP and their predecessors would just disappear.

I can't understand why anyone would vote for anyone else at this point in our history, its pretty clear that there is a huge difference between the health and post secondary education standards of North America and the rest of the Western world where labour parties have formed government. Australia, Europe, New Zealand, and Great Britain are all far less institutionally classist than NA but if Canadians are stupid enough to keep voting for the same corrupt cliques than its hard to feel too sorry for them. But i'd love to have someone like Jason tell me to my face that my riding deserves to be run out of town for not being as fucking stupid as his ideal riding.